Tag Archives: OLT

OLT Express Germany (Bremen) following the lead of OLT Express Poland, ceased all operations yesterday (January 27) due to financial difficulties and a reported disagreement with its owner, Panta Holdings. Panta Holdings was not interested in injecting more capital into the struggling carrier.

OLT Express (Germany) (Bremen) is transforming itself from a regional feeder airline into a new point-to-point low-cost carrier according to Airline Route.

Starting on October 15, 2012, the redesigned airline will open new bases at Dresden, Muenster and Saarbruecken. In addition, the airline will open 14 new routes including new service to Budapest, Southend (near London), Milan (Malpensa), Paris (CDG) and Vienna.

Under the leadership of Panta Holdings, OLT Express (Germany) will continue its expansion plans by integrating Contact Air (Stuttgart) in early September.

Panta Holdings has been active in the aviation industry with Dutch company Denim Airways and leasing company Mass lease. In addition, Panta is involved in the Canadian supplier Avcorp Industries. Panta Holdings also owned VLM Airlines in the past before it was sold to the Air France-KLM Group.

After Amber Gold announced it was getting out of the aviation industry after the recent failure of OLT Express (Poland) there was a period of uncertainty for the employees of the OLT Express (Germany) and Contact Air. Now they have a more secure future.

Copyright Photo: Andi Hiltl. The Fokker 100 will now be the main aircraft for the new OLT Express. Fokker F.28 Mk. 0100 D-AOLG approaches for landing in the bright 2011 livery at Zurich. Unfortunately this color scheme is now also associated with the failure of OLT Express (Poland) which made headlines when it stranded passengers. A new branding effort by the new owners could become a new reality.

OLT Express (Poland) (formerly Yes Airways) (Warsaw) suspended all scheduled operations after the last flight of the day last night (July 26). All flights scheduled today are cancelled. Charter flights however will be operated. Owner Amber Gold Group has stopped funding the airline and the airline is now searching for new investors. The carrier has promised to give full refunds. The airline was operating scheduled domestic flights in Poland and international holiday flights since April.

Yes Airways changed its name to OLT Express in January 2012 following the acquisition by Amber Gold.

It is not known how this move by the Amber Gold Group will affect OLT Express (Germany).

OLT Express Germany (Bremen) took over the operations of Contact Air Service GmbH & Co. KG (Stuttgart) on July 4. Both companies will continue to operate under the OLT Express brand. Anti-trust clearance of the acquisition is expected to be completed in early September 2012.

With the acquisition, OLT Express Germany now employs about 500 additional employees. Of these, there are approximately 200 employees in Bremen, about 200 in Stuttgart and about 100 in Saarbruecken.